Cheating for the Chicken Man

by Priscilla Cummings

  “Will you leave J.T. alone?” she asked.

  “Maybe.” Curtis shrugged. “Maybe not. Guess it depends on how I feel.”

  What a jerk, Kate thought. He’s never going to stop.

  “Did you do the assignment for writing class?” Kate asked.

  He made a funny grunting sound. “No—”

  “Then here. We had a deal, remember?”

  Hurriedly, Kate pushed the paper into Curtis’s hand, and this time he accepted it. She looked at him, and their eyes met. “Now leave J.T. alone.”

  It was done. She had officially cheated. There was no going back.

  *

  A funny thing happened next: nothing.

  Nothing happened.

  For an entire week, nobody bullied J.T. Every day, he went to school. He completed all his assignments. He cleaned out both chicken houses and hooked up the bucket loader to the John Deere to scrape out several inches of caked chicken manure from the floors. He cut the rhododendron bushes back from around the house. He taught Tucker a new trick, weaving between his feet while he walked, and built an outdoor run for Kate’s rabbit. He even dug out his basketball and practiced shooting into the rusty hoop on the back of the tractor shed.

  Grandma had left for North Carolina, but Kate’s mother was getting up early, cooking meals, cleaning, doing the wash, and helping Kerry with homework. She was making dinner, too. She still didn’t drive, however, which forced Kate and J.T. to find rides home when they stayed after school.

  Kate was up to her ears in homework every night, largely because field hockey practice and games took up so much time in the afternoon. She had been playing sweeper regularly and liked the new position. She’d also been making regular trips to feed and check on her three refugee chickens, and at school she had attended the first meeting of the newspaper staff, where she’d signed up to write features. And Marc, her lab partner, had followed up on getting those notes from class the day he had to leave early. They’d even met at lunch one day to study for a quiz.

  “So who is he?” Jess asked as they changed up for field hockey practice.

  “Marc Connors, a boy in my biology class,” Kate said.

  “He’s cute,” Jess said.

  Kate smiled shyly and finished pulling a T-shirt over her head. “We were just studying for a quiz.”

  “Uh-huh, uh-huh.”

  Kate didn’t say anything more, but Jess was in a chatty mood.

  “Guess what movie I watched last night? Mr. Popper’s Penguins. Remember that book in second grade?”

  Kate grinned. “In homeschool we made lapbooks for it!”

  “I loved making those, didn’t you? All those pictures and poems we pasted in. I still have the one I did for Black Beauty.

  Jess finished tying her cleats and scooted down the bench to sit closer to Kate, who stood at the full-length mirror dividing her hair to make pigtails.

  “Kate, can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.” Kate’s eyes flicked to her friend’s.

  “Olivia’s having a sleepover Friday night. You won’t be mad if I go, will you?”

  “Of course not,” Kate replied automatically, while ignoring the pinch deep inside. She focused back on herself in the mirror and kept braiding.

  “I didn’t want to do it behind your back,” Jess said.

  “Don’t be silly.”

  An awkward moment passed. Jess examined her fingernails while Kate braided.

  “Okay, well, thanks,” Jess said. “I’ll see you outside, okay?”

  Kate gathered hair into her hand for the second pigtail. “Yup. I’ll be right out.”

  “Jess!” Kate called suddenly, running after her friend.

  Jess turned at the door.

  “I just wondered,” Kate said, hesitating, still holding one unfinished braid. “Are we still going to the county fair like we always do? Just you and me?”

  Jess beamed a reassuring smile. “Of course!” she said before sprinting out the door.

  *

  We’ll get our friendship back on track, I know we will, Kate wrote in her journal that night. Just as soon as I can stop worrying about J.T. and what I did for Curtis. I think about going to Mr. Ellison and confessing but then I know Curtis would just start up again. . . .

  As the days went by, Kate had begun to think that the cheating might be completely in the past, when Mr. Ellison decided to read a few of their author note assignments aloud in class.

  The first one he chose was written by Jasmine Albright about making beaded jewelry. She called her book Gems by Jasmine. The second piece chosen to be read aloud, Breaking Boards, was by Jim Tucker, who described working toward a black belt in karate. The third was Kate’s: Treasure Hunting on the River, by Kathryn Tyler.

  “Ever since she was little,” Mr. Ellison began reading, “Kate Tyler has loved walking the riverbank to look for sea glass that washes up on the narrow beach. Over the years, she has collected jars full of pieces large and small in all colors of the rainbow. Miss Tyler says, “‘It’s amazing how, over time, an ugly shard of broken glass from a discarded bottle of beer or ginger ale is transformed into a smooth, polished piece of sea glass.’”

  After he finished reading, Mr. Ellison noted Kate’s word choices: shard instead of piece, and transformed instead of made. “Make every word count,” he said. Kate felt her cheeks flush with pride and embarrassment. But there wasn’t time to bask in the praise. The next assignment Mr. Ellison chose to read aloud was Fishing for Striped Bass in the Bay, by Curtis Jenkins.

  Why was that piece the next one? Kate’s stomach clenched. Did he suspect something? Kate couldn’t help glancing across the room. She watched Curtis stretch his eyes like he was waking up from a nap and sit up from his slouched position.

  “This is a book that every fisherman should have on the shelf or in the tackle box,” Mr. Ellison read aloud. “A lifelong resident of the Eastern Shore, sixteen-year-old Jenkins has been fishing the bay’s rivers and creeks ever since he was five. ‘My brother taught me everything I know about fishing,’ he said. ‘First time out in Pope’s Creek, I snagged a thirty-two-inch rockfish that weighed a hefty sixteen pounds.’”

  Kate took shallow breaths. The phrase, “a cold sweat” popped into her mind. She worried that Mr. Ellison had recognized her writing. It felt like every word read aloud was another blow—another nail pounded into the coffin of her reputation. She was a cheater. It felt like a portion of her soul had died.

  “This book offers tips on when and where to find Maryland’s striped bass, noting that the fish love the deep shipping channels of the bay,” Mr. Ellison continued. “Although most anglers are happy reeling in a twenty-to-thirty-pound rockfish, Jenkins says it’s not unheard of to catch a trophy rockfish upwards of one hundred pounds in the Chesapeake Bay. This is Jenkins’s first book.”

  “So! What do we learn about Curtis from this piece?” Mr. Ellison asked.

  A hand went up. “That he really loves fishing,” a boy said.

  “But is that a reason you’d want to buy this book?” the teacher probed.

  A girl this time. “No, but the book is full of tips and advice.”

  “What pulls us into this piece? What did we talk about last week?” Mr. Ellison asked the class.

  “Specifics,” a student told him. “He started out by saying the first time he ever fished was with his brother in Pope’s Creek.”

  “Good!” Mr. Ellison responded. “This piece also tells me that Curtis Jenkins is a pretty good writer. When he walked into class last week and said he was here because there was no place else for him to go, I had my doubts. But not anymore.”

  Kate had stopped breathing. Was Mr. Ellison being sarcastic because he knew the truth?

  Everyone in class was turning to look at Curtis, who sat tall, smirking, with his arms crossed
tightly across his chest.

  “Writing comes from a deep well inside each of us,” Mr. Ellison said. “You can learn a lot about yourself by writing.”

  For sure, Kate thought. She had learned a lot about herself by writing. Specifically, that her writing had made her a cheater. It was real. There was no going back. She wasn’t a perfect student anymore.

  When class was over, Kate was the first person out the door.

  “Kate!” she heard Curtis call in the hallway. “Wait!”

  But Kate was not waiting or stepping aside for Curtis Jenkins this time. She plowed her way through the crowd at the doors and practically ran down the stairs.

  ~14~

  CONFLICTED

  Saturday morning, Kerry sat at the kitchen table eating a warm oatmeal muffin and, with sticky fingers, arranging piles of plastic beads according to color and size. She was still in pajamas, with two long braids, fuzzy and rumpled from sleep, falling forward over her shoulders.

  “Not right now,” Kate warned as she reached across the table with a damp cloth and wiped off the breakfast crumbs. “I said after I get my chores done, remember?”

  Kerry continued sorting.

  “Did you hear me? Hey, and don’t get crumbs all over, Kerry. I just cleaned there!” She put Kerry’s muffin on a plate and wiped the plastic tablecloth a second time. Then she started the dishwasher and wrapped up half a dozen muffins in tinfoil, a small gift for Jess’s mom, who was taking her food shopping later. Kate’s job again, since Grandma was away for a while.

  It had been two weeks since Kate wrote the paper for Curtis, and several days since Mr. Ellison read it in class. The weekend’s arrival was a relief. Yet still, there was a sharp edge to the way Kate felt, a tight feeling in the pit of her stomach. After wiping off the table, she wrung out the dish cloth a second time because she couldn’t remember if she’d done it the first time and draped it over the edge of the dish drainer.

  “If anyone needs me, I’ll be down at the tractor shed,” J.T. said as he came through the kitchen.

  Kate watched him put on his Orioles cap and walk out. She grabbed a carrot and a chunk of lettuce from the refrigerator and tapped Kerry on the head. “I’ll be back in a few minutes, okay? I need to feed Hoppy.” But what she really wanted to do was find out how school was going for J.T. Was Curtis leaving him alone? Was there at least some payoff for what she had done?

  Kate found her brother in the tractor shed standing on a wooden crate so he could pop open the engine lid on the big John Deere. After peering inside, he pulled out a mouse nest from behind the battery and flung it behind him making Kate jump.

  “Sorry! Didn’t see you!” J.T. apologized. “This tractor hasn’t been driven in over a year. It’s no wonder the mice moved in. Hey, Kate, while you’re here, would you give me the grease gun?”

  Kate retrieved the tool from a shelf behind her and handed it to her brother.

  “Miss Hatcher is coming this morning,” J.T. said as he started squirting grease on the tractor’s joints. “She wanted to take us bowling, but I told her I didn’t think we’d have time.”

  “Bowling?” Kate crossed her arms. “Your probation officer is taking you bowling?”

  “Us, Kate. She wanted you to go, too. Duckpins though, on account of her little girl would have to come, too.”

  “I have to do the food shopping,” Kate said.

  “Yeah, and I’ve got the new chicks arriving.” J.T. stepped off the crate and kneeled to reach the lower tractor joints. “I’ll tell her another time.”

  “Another time, for sure,” Kate agreed. “It would be fun. Could we invite Jess, too?” she asked, not forgetting that the sleepover at Olivia’s was last night.

  “Sure,” J.T. said.

  Kate leaned against the wall and watched J.T. work. “So, how are things going at school?” she asked after a while.

  “Okay,” J.T. replied. He seemed pretty upbeat. “Did I ever tell you what I’m doing for my science club project?”

  “No,” Kate said. “What is it?”

  J.T. stood and picked up the crate with one hand so he could move to the other side of the tractor.

  Kate uncrossed her arms and followed.

  “I’m going to try to see what’s in that poultry feed by testing the chicken manure,” J.T. said, stepping back up on the crate. “Our science club adviser, Mr. Stanley, says we might be able to use labs at the community college.”

  Kate loved seeing J.T.’s old enthusiasm. “So how are you getting that manure?” And then it hit her. “Hey! Are you sneaking onto other farms at night to get samples?”

  J.T. stopped greasing the tractor and looked down at her. “Can you keep something between us, Kate?”

  “Of course,” she said.

  He stepped down off the crate. “Sneaking onto other farms at night is exactly what I’ve been doing.”

  “That’s where you’ve been going at night?”

  J.T. nodded.

  Kate almost laughed with relief. “I thought it was drugs!”

  “Drugs?”

  “Yeah, that little Baggie of stuff.”

  “You saw that? That was chicken manure!”

  When J.T. started to laugh, so did Kate. “Before that, I thought maybe you were out there exercising or something to get in shape.”

  “For what?”

  “I don’t know! To fight, maybe. Fight Curtis.”

  J.T. rolled his eyes. “Oh, wow. Man, I wouldn’t do that, Kate. If I got into a fistfight, I’d get sent back to Cliffside.”

  “I know! That’s why I worried!” Kate exclaimed. “But stealing manure. I mean, couldn’t that get you in trouble, too? Or get those farmers in trouble?”

  “No, I’m not identifying the farms.”

  “Are you looking for arsenic?”

  “What? You knew?”

  “You told me about it once, remember? You said arsenic was in the feed bags Dad used to cut open.”

  “Oh, yeah, I did. Well, that’s the big one, for sure,” J.T. confirmed. “I mean, they’re not supposed to put that stuff in the feed anymore, but I wanted to check.” He stepped back up on the crate so he could go back to greasing the tractor joints.

  Kate moved closer and crossed her arms. “Okay, here’s what I don’t get,” she said. “If chickens get fed arsenic, then how come they don’t get sick and die?”

  “Because it’s not poison when it’s in the feed,” J.T. said as he worked.

  When J.T. saw Kate frown, he paused and came down off the crate once again. “Look,” he said. “There are two kinds of arsenic—organic and inorganic. Organic arsenic occurs naturally. It’s in the soil; it’s in our water. The kind of arsenic they might put in chicken feed is organic. They put it in the feed to kill a parasite that may or may not be in the chicken’s gut. But in the chicken’s body, the organic arsenic changes into inorganic arsenic.”

  “It changes?”

  “Yes! It turns into the kind of inorganic arsenic that’s bad, that can cause cancer. Plus, because it’s in the chicken, it not only ends up in their meat, but in their manure, which is used on fields to grow vegetables! Then, when it rains, all that chicken manure gets washed into our streams, where it can affect the fish!”

  Kate was astonished. “It affects the fish, too?”

  “Yeah. What do you think Dad and Uncle Ray always argued about? Mostly runoff from the chicken manure. Dad’s business was affecting Uncle Ray’s. The watermen and the chicken farmers, they’re always fighting. But their whole ways of living are at stake.”

  Perplexed, Kate pressed her fingertips to her temples. “So if Maryland and other states already ban arsenic from the feed, why are you looking for it?”

  “I just want to check,” J.T. said. “From what I read, no one’s testing for it. Wouldn’t it be something if I found some? Or
something else? Maybe even something worse?”

  Kate crossed her arms again. “I still don’t understand, not totally, but it sounds important. I just hope you don’t get us all in trouble.”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t. But don’t tell Mom or Uncle Ray, okay? I don’t want them to freak out. Hey, and by the way, my manure samples are in the freezer.”

  “Yuck! You put chicken manure in our freezer?”

  “No big deal. It’s under that frozen lasagna.”

  Kate made a face. “Yeah. Well, I’ll try not to use it for dinner one night.”

  J.T. snorted and went back to work while Kate started toward the house.

  “Kate, wait!” J.T. called after her. She stopped and turned.

  J.T. came to the door of the shed with the grease gun in his hand. “I just wanted to thank you. I mean, I never did tell you how much I appreciated you getting the trumpet out to me so I could play at Dad’s funeral.”

  Kate started to smile. “You’re welcome.”

  Just then, a huge flock of honking Canada geese flew close overhead, moving toward the cornfield across the street. As the flock’s shadow passed over, Kate and J.T. leaned their heads back to watch and listen as the air was stirred by hundreds of wings. It was an awesome sound. Kate loved it when the geese came. There was something reassuring and hopeful about their arrival. J.T. grinned and seemed to be thinking the same thing.

  An arriving text message interrupted her thoughts.

  “Gotta get going. See you up at the house,” Kate said as she pulled out her phone.

  Curtis: I need to talk to u.

  What? A message from Curtis with a smiley face?

  Kate: STAY OUT OF MY LIFE!

  Angrily, Kate shoved the phone back in her pocket, but it dinged again.

  Curtis: Don’t have to yell. Since u don’t want to talk, the new assignment is what role did the nile river play in early civilization? 2 pages doublespace due tuesday.

  Kate’s eyes grew large with disbelief. She texted back so fast her fingers hit all the wrong letters and she had to delete everything and start over.